Here's the Powerful Story Behind the Pussyhats at the Women's March

Hundreds of thousands of women took to the streets on Saturday to stand up for women's rights and protest the newly inaugurated President Trump at the Women's March on Washington—and many, many little pink hats with cat ears were there too. Called "Pussyhats," the collective sight of the knitted, crocheted, or sewn caps made a visual statement on the streets. But chances are, unless you were one of the women who made or wore one of them, you might not know the story of sisterhood and solidarity they symbolize.

Called the Pussyhat Project, these cozy little hats were actually part of a movement that began after the November election in anticipation of the Women's March. Started by Krista Suh and Jayna Zweiman, the original idea was for marchers to knit, sew, or crochet hats to create a visual statement —a "sea of pink"—at the protest in Washington, D.C. "If everyone at the march wears a pink hat, the crowd will be a sea of pink, showing that we stand together, united," reads the introduction to the knitting pattern on the Pussyhat Project website.

And then there's a second part that brings even more voices into the picture: People who couldn't physically be at the Women's March—but in a perfect world would be—could knit a hat for a marcher who was going, in order to still "represent themselves and support women's rights," says the intro, continuing later, "By knitting a hat for a marcher, you are a part of a powerful visual statement."

"The idea is both a play on pussyhat, pussycat, and also references the hot mic from the Access Hollywood video. It does reference Donald Trump and those comments, but it's also so much more," said Zweiman before the March. "It's reappropriating the word 'pussy' in a positive way. It's a pussyhat -- one word. This is a project about women supporting women."

By making Pussyhats, the organizers also look to reclaim two elements that are traditionally associated with femininity and womanhood—and derided precisely because of those reasons. "Pink is considered a very female color representing caring, compassion, and love – all qualities that have been derided as weak but are actually STRONG," the intro continues. "Wearing pink together is a powerful statement that we are unapologetically feminine and we unapologetically stand for women’s rights."

The fact that Suh and Zweiman didn't just ask women to go buy a pink hat and send it in was also deliberate: They wanted to celebrate knitting and crochet precisely because they're traditionally women's crafts—and skills passed from generation to generation: "Knitting circles are sometimes scoffed at as frivolous 'gossiping circles,' when really, these circles are powerful gatherings of women, a safe space to talk, a place where women support women."

It's this kind of space that brought Suh and Zweiman together: the two met at The Little Knitters in L.A.'s Atwater Village neighborhood, one such safe space for women to gather and talk. "Part of knitting is that you have this time, and breath to be able to really have conversations," Zweiman said. Once the election results were announced on November 9, the Women's March became a place for the duo to expand the conversation about women's rights on a much, much larger scale. And the Pussyhat Project, launched Thanksgiving weekend, was the perfect way to accomplish that.

The pattern their knitting teacher, Kat Coyle, made was created to be simple and easy to customize, so knitters, sewers, and crocheters of any level could make it their own—and once the word got out on social media, it spread quickly in the knitting community. Those making the hat were to either give them to a marcher, drop it off at a drop site, or mail it to D.C. Marchers on the receiving end then could pick them up in D.C. the week of the march.

It seems like it's been a smashing success: An estimated 60,000 hats were sent in by the end of December from every state and places as far away as Europe and New Zealand. We're still waiting on an official tally, but the sisterhood and camaraderie linking the marchers and makers is stronger than any number.

For more perspectives on the march and how we can all be better activists going forward, check out the "Marching For Yourself" episode of Glamour's podcast, Work Wives: